iPhone 5: a little bit taller, a little bit baller

And if you've got a girl, you can call her. On LTE.

LTE

One of the most significant new features in the iPhone 5 is the addition of 4G LTE support. Yes, the iPhone is behind some of its peers in the smartphone world when it comes to LTE; Apple has long defended itself on charges of being a laggard by trotting out the company line that 4G chips are bulky and require more power than the company has been willing to give them. Apple has always prioritized power savings and thinness when it comes to the iPhone's design—when viewed from that perspective, it's not particularly shocking that it took this long to add LTE support. But now that it's here, we're so glad to have it.

In the US, different versions of the iPhone 5 can run on LTE networks from AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint. Because of the differences between networks and LTE bands, not all iPhone 5s are the same—an AT&T iPhone 5 can run on AT&T's LTE network but not Verizon's. A Verizon or Sprint iPhone 5 can run on both Verizon's and Sprint's LTE networks, but not AT&T's. All iPhone 5s can roam internationally on GSM networks using the slower UMTS and HSPA+ standards (the Verizon iPhone 5 can do CDMA in the US, but is GSM unlocked for roaming purposes).

But if you want to roam globally on the fast LTE networks in other countries, take a careful look at which LTE bands are compatible with which iPhone 5. For instance, as we wrote earlier this month, the Verizon/Sprint iPhone 5 is compatible with the LTE networks in more countries than is the AT&T iPhone 5.

As with any kind of cellular device, your own experiences between carriers will vary wildly depending on where you live and in what circumstances you use your iPhone. In the US, some cities have significantly better Verizon coverage than AT&T, while in others it's the reverse. Some cities have seriously high-class Sprint coverage (Kansas City, I'm looking at you). And if you live in a rural area, you already know that it can be somewhat of a crapshoot when it comes to cell coverage. I personally have had decent luck with both Verizon and AT&T in the middle of nowhere in Kansas, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Indiana, though you're unlikely to get LTE speeds in more rural parts of America. Most of the time, 3G is the best you can get—if that.

Because of the variables, I'll refrain from giving you a personal recommendation on which carrier is best, but I can tell you about my experiences in three major urban settings: Chicago (where I live), New York, and San Francisco (the two places I travel most). For quite some time, I was a big fan of AT&T in Chicago until some point in 2011, when the network inexplicably gave up on life as we know it. Ask any Chicagoan—I have asked many—and they will complain about AT&T's data network, especially when you get into the Loop. You could have full voice signal and not be able to receive a single data packet on 4G, 3G, EDGE, or (ugh) even GPRS. Forget trying to meet up with friends somewhere downtown; texts won't go through under any circumstances, and I sure hope you weren't planning to look up your destination on a map. Voice calls occasionally work.

For many months now, I have also carried around a Verizon device—you know things are bad when you have to carry around a separate device just to communicate—and I simply do not have these problems. This is the case even when using the devices side-by-side in the same locations at the same times. I have also done this in New York and San Francisco with similar results, though the difference seems less extreme in San Francisco. Your mileage, as always, will vary.

For this review, then, I used an iPhone 5 on Verizon's LTE network. (Once I have access to an iPhone 5 on AT&T's LTE network, I hope to write a separate article that more directly compares data speeds between the two.) I have some past experience using Verizon's LTE network on other devices—particularly my third-gen iPad, but also standalone hotspots and USB dongles—so I had some idea of what to expect. Here in Chicago, Verizon's LTE speeds are quite respectable. During 2012, I have typically seen around 8-12 Mbps download speeds over LTE, and even on the worst days, I rarely see anything below 4Mbps download speeds.

This was indeed the case for my iPhone 5. I ran tests in seven different locations—including downtown and several different neighborhoods on the north and west sides of the city.

Pings

Downloads

Uploads

44ms

4.63Mbps

0.15Mbps

38ms

4.12Mbps

2.69Mbps

45ms

9.05Mbps

9.59Mbps

41ms

9.93Mbps

9.76Mbps

39ms

9.34Mbps

8.53Mbps

46ms

10.97Mbps

3.65Mbps

35ms

11.01Mbps

8.64Mbps

As you can see from the above chart, my fastest ping speed was 35ms and the slowest was 46ms—not much of a difference when you're talking about milliseconds. The fastest download speed was 11.01Mbps—faster than my Comcast cable modem, many days—and the slowest was 4.12Mbps. The fastest upload speed was 9.76Mbps—again, faster than my cable modem by a long shot—and the slowest was 0.15Mbps. More subjectively, it wasn't hard to send and receive tweets, perform Web searches, and do other basic activities, even at the lowest speeds.

Not only were the speeds respectable, but I was also able to actually use the data network in every place I tested the iPhone 5. But I can't stress enough that your own coverage situation might mean that your results will be different than mine. Luckily, most carriers allow you to return a device within 30 days without (much) penalty, so if you discover that one carrier isn't delivering what you expected, you can probably switch.

Battery life

Apple claims up to eight hours of talk time, up to 225 hours of standby time, up to eight hours of Internet use over 3G or LTE, up to ten hours of video playback, and up to 40 hours of audio playback on the iPhone 5. The key words here are "up to," but in my experience, Apple's estimates are close to accurate. Apple does not explicitly detail its own battery testing process, but it's safe to assume that countless variables can affect battery life at any given time, including: screen brightness, whether you're on WiFi/3G/LTE/airplane mode, whether you have push notifications turned on, whether you have apps running in the background, and even what kinds of tasks you're performing.

I performed my own "typical use" test on the iPhone 5 three times. I spent time surfing the Web, listening to iTunes music, watching a movie I purchased from iTunes, sending and receiving texts, writing in the Notes app, reading the news, and making a couple of short voice calls. When I'm aiming for "typical use," I leave all cellular data connections turned on (in this case, it was LTE pretty much all the time) but I do use WiFi when available. I leave the screen brightness dead in the middle, and I use headphones to listen to audio/video at roughly 3/4 the maximum volume. I don't typically use many push notifications, but the ones I do have (Messages, Calendar, Reminders, Facebook, Phone, Passbook, Buster, and a few others) I leave turned on as well.

My three tests under typical use resulted in battery life times of 8 hours, then 8 hours and 47 minutes, and finally 9 hours and 20 minutes. This puts my average at 8 hours and 42 minutes—longer than Apple's estimated time for Internet use, but a bit less than Apple's estimated time for video. Since I did a combination of both for all my tests, I'm satisfied with those results.

I also performed two video-only tests. For both, brightness was left right in the middle and volume was about 3/4 the max. During the first test, I left WiFi and LTE on and continued to receive push notifications. The phone lasted just under six hours. For the second test, I put the iPhone 5 into airplane mode so all wireless communications were off and I was unable to receive any kind of notifications. Here, the phone lasted just over 8 hours. Both of these tests were below Apple's estimate of "up to 10 hours" for video.

Finally, I performed one standby test. I put the iPhone 5 on my nightstand with everything but the screen turned on (WiFi, LTE, push notifications, iMessages, alarm clocks, etc.). Basically, I left the phone as I would on a normal night, when I might expect to receive some messages or phone calls but was not actively using the device. My iPhone 5 drained 10 percent of its battery over the course of 12 hours, with a couple of iMessages coming in during that time and at least one alarm going off. Extrapolating from this test, one can guess that my total standby time draining from 100 percent to zero would be roughly 120 hours, or five days. While this is less than Apple's estimate of 225 hours, I consider five days to already be quite optimistic. I feel reasonably confident that the phone will at least last a weekend without needing a charge.

As for charging speed, I was able to charge up my iPhone from 10 percent battery to 100 percent within a few hours (usually 2.5 to 3 hours) when plugged into my computer or the included power adapter. Even just an hour of charging took the phone up to a very comfortable level. Others have complained in the past about slow charging times on older iOS devices—I've admittedly never run into those problems myself, but I made sure to pay special attention to charging times for this reason. The iPhone 5 did not take an exceptionally long time to charge.

One last note when it comes to battery life. There's been plenty of debate in recent years about the value of completely discharging lithium-based batteries—we even wrote an Ask Ars on the topic last year that's worth checking out. Currently, Apple recommends a full discharge/recharge cycle once per month, so as long as you're not discharging the battery to zero every day, it's probably safe to do.